Fluentish vs Anki
Fluentish and Anki share a scheduling algorithm, FSRS, and almost nothing else: Anki is a general-purpose flashcard engine you fill with your own cards and grade yourself, while Fluentish is a language course delivered as a feed that grades you from how fast you answer.
An honest comparison, and the friendliest one here: Fluentish uses the same scheduling algorithm and exports into Anki on purpose.
Is Fluentish better than Anki?
They are not the same kind of thing, so neither is better in general. Anki is a spaced-repetition engine: it is empty until you fill it, and it will schedule absolutely anything you put in it, in any subject. Fluentish is a language course that happens to use spaced repetition inside it. If you already keep a deck you trust, Anki is not something Fluentish replaces.
What is the main difference between Fluentish and Anki?
Where the content comes from, and who does the grading. Anki starts empty: you write the cards, or download a shared deck someone else wrote, and you judge each answer yourself by pressing Again, Hard, Good or Easy. Fluentish arrives with the course already built for your language pair, and grades you from how fast you answered, which is not a button you have to press or a judgement you have to make.
Do Fluentish and Anki use the same algorithm?
They share one: FSRS, the open-source spaced-repetition scheduler, which Anki offers as a scheduler and Fluentish uses for words you have shown you know. The scheduling maths is genuinely the same idea. What differs is the input it runs on: in Anki the grade is your own honest self-report, and in Fluentish it is your answer latency, measured whether you think about it or not.
What does a session look like in each?
Anki gives you a queue: cards due today, counted down until the queue is empty, which is a genuinely satisfying end state and also the thing that turns into a backlog after a week away. Fluentish has no queue and no end: review cards are mixed into the same feed as new material, so there is nothing to fall behind on and nothing to clear.
What does each one cost?
Anki is free and open-source software on desktop and Android, funded partly by a paid app on iOS; check apps.ankiweb.net for the current platforms and prices. Fluentish is free through level 3 (or through your placement level if you place higher) with unlimited scrolling and no ads, and Fluentish Plus is $7.99/month or $39.99/year.
Can I use Fluentish and Anki together?
Yes, and they fit together deliberately. Fluentish Plus exports your learned dictionary in Anki format as well as CSV, so words you have earned in the feed can go straight into a deck you already maintain. Using the feed for volume and your own deck for the handful of words you care most about is a reasonable way to run both.
Who is Anki better for?
Anki is the better fit if you want control: your own cards, your own wording, any subject at all, a huge ecosystem of shared decks, deep statistics, add-ons, and a desktop app built for people who are serious about their deck. It is also free on most platforms and your data is yours on disk, which matters to a lot of people.
Who is Fluentish better for?
Fluentish is the better fit if the honest obstacle is that you will never build or vet a deck. The course is already there, the cards rotate through several formats so it does not read like a worksheet, review is invisible rather than a queue, and it is designed for a phone in one hand. That applies to seven pairs: English speakers can learn Spanish, Italian, French, German or Arabic; Spanish and French speakers can learn English.
At a glance
| Aspect | Fluentish | Anki |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | A language course delivered as an adaptive feed | A general-purpose spaced-repetition flashcard engine |
| Content | Already built for your language pair, and it arrives full | Whatever you write or download; empty by default |
| Scheduling | FSRS, applied to words you have shown you know | FSRS, available as a scheduler |
| Grading | Inferred from answer speed; you are never asked to rate yourself | You rate every card yourself: Again, Hard, Good or Easy |
| Shape of a sitting | A feed with no session, no queue and no end screen | A queue of cards due today, worked down until it is empty |
| Card formats | Several, rotating: tap, gap-fill, stories, plus typing and speech on Plus | Whatever your note types and templates define |
| Platforms | iOS and Android | Desktop, Android, iOS and the web; see apps.ankiweb.net |
| Price | Free through level 3+; Plus $7.99/month or $39.99/year | Free and open source, with a paid iOS app; see apps.ankiweb.net |
Anki is a trademark of its respective owner. Fluentish is not affiliated with Anki, and Anki's current platforms and pricing are on apps.ankiweb.net.
Other comparisons
- Fluentish vs Duolingo The gamified course everyone has tried. Lessons, units, hearts and XP, against one feed with none of them.
- Fluentish vs Babbel Teacher-written lessons and real conversation practice, against a feed that explains a rule the moment you trip over it.
New here? Start with what Fluentish is, in plain answers, see how the feed works, or ask anything via the support page. All the comparisons are indexed on the compare page.